Session 5: Through the Gallery of the Ancients Report
General Summary
"Only death awaits you," the creature with no head spoke with its phantom voice. "All that Safeguards gathers to himself, all that it sends to delay the inevitable, all of them end up as dead, broken meat." The creature offered an alternative. Use the seal to leave the way they came in with. Leave, and let it out with them. If they did this, it would trouble them no more. Maul-Moir asked politely what the creature would do with its freedom. It's reply was simple. "Whatever I wish." Detecting falsehood, and pushing further, the creature, apparently feeling no need to lie, said it would destroy Safeguard before it did, ensuring the Singing Monolith's imminent rise. It was about this time a voice from behind alerted the group, and those in back turned to see a gnome, newly passed through the seal, looking about curiously as if he had simply wandered in. Sensing the time for negotiation had ended, the creature attacked, trying to sieze Kuno's mind, and when that failed, tried to sieze control of his cyphers instead. The party engaged it, finding its strage metal flesh resistant to almost all they could do to it, quickly repairing itself from most wounds. It seemed weak to attacks of the mind, however, and Raelyn used her magic to attack it, and Maul brought his divine magic to bear. Slowy, they wore the creature down, it's flesh cracking to reveal an storm of energy underneath, just like what was made of its head. Kuno confounded its regeneration abilities, whcih gave the party enough time to destroy its form. However, it wasn't until Anima sent a charge of electricity into the whirling mass of energy that remained that the creature finally fell. The creature destroyed, attention turned to the gnome, who said it had come there at the behest of a dream, something that would indeed be reasonable coming from a gnome. He said he saw a woman working foul magic before a singing monolith, and he felt the need to stop it, if to keep her from defiling the tek of the Ancients, if nothing else. Agreeing to allow the gnome, whose name was Galdimere, to join the group, the party ventured furher down the gallery tunnel, taking pains to avoid the speeding traveler. This was after they took the time to confirm that, yes, it looked like any creature caught before the thing would likely be killed. Exploring the facility, they found a number of strange rooms. They found a green floor that nearly drew in the gnome at its touch (saved only some work of the party), another room they came to bore a strange arch that Raelyn, studying it's surface, inadvertantly crossed through and found herself knocked unconscious. When she awoke (with a considerable headache), she found she had knowledge of a new language, one with words and concepts she had no analog for in any language. Intrigued, both Kuno and Galdimere followed suit, taking both the period of unconsciousness and the splitting headache to also gain use of the long dead language. It was further down, however, that the group found a series of holding cells, where they found a number of the townspeople. They were still alive, but had cyphers grafted onto their flesh, just as the cypherwights had. They were scared, hurt, and disoriented, and clearly already in the process of being transformed into something horrible and alien. It was Urulay who had done this, they said. Urulay from town. Vowing to save them, the group set up camp in the room. They used a relic they discovered to stall the progression of the things Urulay had grafted onto them while Maul-Moir prepaired magics to try and save them. Setting up a defensive parameter, the group camped to rest and recouperate from the fight with the dangerou, headless creature from earlier. Before the rest, however, Kuno and Anima ventured just a bit further to see the next alcove down the gallery. They found a strange green room with machinary in it, which Kuno investigated. These machines activated, paralyzing Kuno and leaving him on the ground convulsing and, more distressingly, with smoke rise from his mouth, nose, and eyes. Anima called the rest of the group there and together they used rope to pull Kuno to safety. Before they could try to revive him, however, he seemed to revoer on his own. Recover, save for an incredibly insatiable apetite, which lead him to devour several days worth of rations in minutes. Afterwards, though, this hunger left him. Not just that hunger, but any hunger. Every again. It seemed the room had altered Kuno in a strange and profound way. It would be as Kuno contemplated this, standing watch while the group rested, that from a corridor ahead of them they heard movement. Barriers were erected just as they saw the arrival of not one, but five cypherwights coming down the corridor towards the group. As for what happens next, we shall find out next time!
